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for calling CalUSA Insurance. Suzie speaking. How can I help you today?”
    “My car—” Kate choked on the word. Suddenly she was back in the canyon, shaking from head to foot.
    “Did you have an accident?” Suzie said gently.
    Pull it together, Kate told herself. She set Nick’s book on the desk, plopped down on the chair, and described the wreck. She wasn’t sure Suzie believed her about the three-foot-tall condor, but ten minutes later Kate had a claim number.
    Fortified, she hung up and decided to tackle the next item on her list: Check the Subaru.
    She snagged the keys from a hook in the pantry and headed for the stairs that connected to the garage from the back deck. The oak tree next to the house dropped thousands of acorns every fall, and it seemed to Kate every acorn in the Los Padres National Forest was outside her door. Using her feet like brooms, she swept the acorns out of the way, listening as they clattered to the edge and fell. Between sweeps, an eerie silence echoed in her ears. Her condo was considered quiet. But quiet and silent were as different as pale pink and magenta. Lately Kate had been in a magenta kind of mood—a blend of red with a dab of blue. The color captured her emotions perfectly. She yearned to experience life in all its glory, yet she wondered every day if her own life had any real purpose.
    She wished she could talk to Leona. Her grandmother dispensed nuggets of wisdom like gumballs. Kate would chew on them and feel better, but today she could only stare longingly at Mount Abel. She had never been to the top, but her grandparents had often made the drive to enjoy the incredible view. On a clear day, a person could see a hundred miles to Catalina Island. Someday Kate would go—or maybe not.The road twisted around cliffs higher than the ones in San Miguel Canyon.
    Suddenly shaky, she shifted her gaze down and eastward to the Meadows business district. The rain had washed the air to crystal clarity, but sometimes clouds settled low and blocked the view of the town. Eyes closed, she relived one of those times.
    “Look, Grandpa! I could jump and the clouds would catch me.”
    “No, Katie. The clouds are nothing but vapor.”
    Her grandfather explained the science to her, but even then Kate had understood a deeper truth. Life was full of illusions. Gazing at the town now, she reluctantly thought of Joel. He’d been fascinated by heights. Or more precisely, he was fascinated by falling. She remembered how frightened she was at Yosemite when he stood at the edge of the lookout on Glacier Point, his toes queued up to the edge of the granite, his arms stretched wide and his eyes shut tight. “ Imagine, Kate, I could stand here without the railing and not fall.”
    He had tried to coax her to the edge, but she refused to budge.
    “Coward,” he said, accusing her.
    She had argued with him, but tonight she wondered if he was right. She was afraid of so many things—mountain roads, dark alleys, being late to work. Of losing Leona and having no one. Of ending up like her mother, alone and dying from a cancer that might have been stopped if Elizabeth Darby had done a monthly breast check. Kate placed her hand over heart in a pledge to be responsible, took a breath, and went to the garage to start the car.
    The side door creaked as she propped it wide to let in light. In her mind she pictured her grandfather at his workbench, making a birdhouse for nuthatches, the quirky littlebirds that ran up and down the trunks of pine trees. Garden tools lined the back wall in a testament to Leona’s passion for pretty flowers, and assorted boxes filled the corners with the clutter of a busy life.
    Without thinking, she pushed the button for the automatic garage door opener. When it didn’t open, she remembered the power outage and tried to open the door manually. It didn’t budge, and she couldn’t recall how to work the manual release. Jaw tight, she tamped down her frustration and prioritized.